Eric Schmidt, current chairman of Alphabet and former CEO of Google, has taken a new role at the Pentagon, where he will lead a board focused on military innovation, reports Reuters.
Defense Secretary Ash Carter and Mr. Schmidt announced the new Defense Innovation Advisory Board, which aims to bring best practices for innovation from Silicon Valley to the military, last week at the annual RSA cybersecurity conference in San Francisco, , according to the report.
"If we don't innovate and be competitive, we're not going to be the military that the country needs and deserves," Mr. Carter said, according to the report. "We should have done it a while ago."
According to a WIRED report, the board will advise the Pentagon on areas of the tech industry's expertise, such as rapid prototyping, iterative product development, business analytics and the cloud.
Mr. Schmidt and Mr. Carter will appoint 12 individuals from the public and private sectors to also serve on the board, reports WIRED.
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